When you teach a college course that’s a mechanical engineering advanced elective called ME309-Structural Mechanics, the shocking collapse of a 47-year-old bridge makes for some pretty interesting classroom discussion.
That was the case this week for Douglas Holmes, a College of Engineering associate professor of mechanics and mechanical engineering, who also leads ENG’s Mechanics of Slender Structures lab.
The incredible footage of a cargo ship in Baltimore striking a support of the Francis Scott Key Bridge on Tuesday, causing the bridge to collapse in seconds like a house of cards, is what Holmes began his classroom discussion with later that day. He showed the students the video and then turned it into a conversation and a lesson around structural mechanics, engineering, and why a steel structure designed to support hundreds of thousands of vehicles every day would collapse so easily.
Read the full story at BU Today